Running on Empty

The Cowtown concert curse struck again last night. I was planning on going to see Echo and the Bunnymen at the Gothic in Engleweed, but the show was cancelled. My guess is that it was due to the big snowstorm we had – two of the major interstates into town were closed. Needless to say, we haven’t seen one flake yet in D-town. Bummer – I even skipped out on two shows last week to save my money for the Bunnymen. I watched an episode from the new MST3K box and had a few drinks last night in an attempt to forget my disappointment – it almost worked!

The latest inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame were announced yesterday. I don’t really have much use for this particular institution, although I’m not totally adverse to the idea of honoring performers who have made real contributions to rock music. (I almost said “as an art form,” but then I’d need to decide whether I consider rock and roll to be high or low art – I think its a bit of each, quite honestly.) That said, this was one of those rare years in which almost every inductee is an act I consider to be pretty cool – the Sex Pistols, Black Sabbath, Blondie (yea! when I heard they were on the ballot I didn’t think they stood a chance), and Miles Davis. Keeping them from batting 1000 with this year’s inductees is the inclusion of (shudder) Lynyrd Skynyrd – yuck. Now all they need to do is get their heads out of the asses and induct the Stooges (on the ballot for umpteen years) and retroactively kick out previous inductees Billy Joel, the Eagles, James Taylor, the Righteous Brothers, U2, and Bob Seger. Then, and only then, I may actually consider going to Cleveland to check out the museum.

Oh yeah, they also need to get rid of Crosby, Stills, and Nash. Those guys are dull as dirt, and David Crosby is a jerk – a stupid, creepy, pompous, burnout, walrus-beast jerk. They should get rid of Eric Clapton as well – Cream and the Yardbirds are in there, and all of his stuff after those bands has been pretty boring. But we’ll let Jackson Browne stay – he used to play guitar for Nico, and that should count for something…

Helloooo Bay-beh!!!

My main man Wanush recently posted his thoughts on February 3, 1959 - “the day the music died.” I’m not going to reiterate what he wrote here (although I agree with it wholeheartedly), but his commentary did remind me of something from my childhood.

When I was in 5th grade, I lived in Houston and attended Hancock Elementary School. That year, the school had its first ever talent show. I don’t recall ever attending a talent show prior to this one. One of the acts was a guy (his name was Scott, he lived about a block from me) lip synching to Chantilly Lace by the Big Bopper. He was all dressed up in a zoot suit, swinging a watch chain around while he mouthed the words. He was a big hit – the teachers who made up the judges panel ranked him in either third or fourth place. The act that came in either first or second was a couple of guys playing acoustic guitars and singing Rock Around the Clock – they were joined by two girls in poodle skirts who sang along and danced. The girls started the act by putting money into a construction paper jukebox, which prompted the duck tailed guys (who had previously been frozen in place) to start singing and playing. I guess the judges and audience were really into the 1950’s nostalgia that was so popular at the time. Happy Days and Sha Na Na were on the television, and Grease was in the theaters - it was a good time to be young and enthralled with an idealized vision of an earlier decade.

Looking back, it just seems so odd – lip synching to a one hit wonder like the Big Bopper. Maybe kids in school talent shows nowadays are lip synching to crappy tunes from the 80’s. As I type this there might be a young man on a grade school auditorium stage, decked out in a powdered wig and miming along to Rock Me Amadeus. Or perhaps he’s dressed in medieval garb and doing the Safety Dance. Actually, the cycle of nostalgia seems to be much shorter nowadays, so he’d more likely be doing a lousy tune from the 90’s – perhaps a kid has shaved his head and is doing a self pitying lip synch to a Smashing Pumpkins song. I suppose anything is possible.

During my junior year a girl who went to a different high school invited me to her school’s talent show. It was pretty weak, overall (although we did get to see future blues star Corey Harris play an instrumental REM song). One of the acts was someone doing a dance routine to that crappy Foreigner tune Urgent. As soon as the tune started, my friend Kerry (who I ran into at the talent show) and I yelled “SWEEEET!” at the top of our lungs. Even better, the sound guy had screwed up and started the tune for the wrong person – the performer waiting to begin her act looked pretty confused!

(Yes, I know that last anecdote had nothing to do with 50’s nostalgia or the stupid Big Bopper. But it did involve a talent show, plus I just think it was awesome that we yelled “SWEEEET!” to a Foreigner tune.)

RIP - Pat Morita

Rumble

A few weeks ago, I caught Veruca Salt at the Hi-Dive. Even in their heyday, they were never more than a blip on my pop culture radar. We have two of their CD’s, both have their moments, but they were hardly one of my musical obsessions at the time. I had no idea they were even still around, and my curiosity got the better of me so I decided to check them out. The li’l woman and I saw them about 9 or 10 years ago – we had gone to catch warm-up act The Muffs, and stuck around to see if the headliners were any good. They were terrific and I’ve kept that memory all this time, so I guess that was enough to give them another try.

Pulling into an empty parking space in front of the club, I couldn’t help but notice the massive tour bus parked right behind me. All I could think was “how can they even afford the gas for that thing, playing a tour of dinky little clubs?” Going into the Hi-Dive, I found the club to be fairly full but no familiar faces. Hearing snippets of conversation made me feel a bit old for the crowd – a heard a couple of fans comparing what year they were in grade school when American Thighs came out! Oh, and just to keep things rooted in the 90’s there were a couple of boneheads running into as many people as possible. I guess they were trying to start a mosh pit! (They were eventually ejected by a couple of other guys from the audience – I don’t think there was anyone working security that night).

The show was pretty enjoyable, even if it felt like a 90’s flashback. Singer Louise Post (sadly, not quite the “alterna-babe” she was in the grunge era) is the only original member, but her current band was tight and the crowd was really vocal in their enjoyment. I recognized a few tunes – All Hail Me, Spiderman ’79, Seether – but I saw people singing along with every song. So, I guess Veruca Salt were an important band for some people back in the day. I don't think I need to see them again, but it certainly didn't feel like a wasted evening.

The next night, I caught a show with the Reigning Sound and the Detroit Cobras. I was out with a group of guys for a “bachelor evening,” and from what I can recall it was a pretty good time! Afterwards, we went to see a local band called Suzy Homewrecker at the Lion’s Lair. I had never heard them, and a couple of the guys warned me that they were “a really bad punk band.” Well, I ended up being pleasantly surprised – they played goofy pop punk tunes, and were fronted by a quirky girl with a really squeaky voice. Pretty amusing if nothing amazing, and especially enjoyable when compared to the truly awful “serious” local punk bands I’ve seen in that lousy venue.

Oh, and I also caught the Briefs and the Bellrays the weekend prior to that…

RIP – Link Wray and Sam (“the world’s ugliest dog”)

Time to start making some banana bread…

Today I received a phone call at work from a woman inquiring if the zoo takes food donations for the animals. We don’t, and she was a bit disappointed – she has 90 (!) pounds of bananas to get rid of. Her brother filled her car with bananas as a practical joke, and she was hoping that the zoo could take them off of her hands.

I just got a call from the li’l woman, asking me if I could stop at the store on the way home. She needs me to pick up something she forgot on her trip there earlier today. Oddly enough, she forgot to get bananas…

Maybe I’m Amazed

Overpriced ticket? Check! Partially obscured view? But of course! How about a stumbling drunk guy talking loudly, clapping out of time, and yelling during the quiet numbers? You know it! If you haven’t guessed by now, I attended my first Cowtown arena concert last week - well, the first since I moved back nearly three years ago. The act was Paul McCartney (famed leader of 70’s super group Wings), and the setting was the Pepsi Center (named for one of Denver’s founding fathers, Jebediah Ezekial Pepsi). I had never been to the Pepsi Center before, and it was…well…a big ugly sports arena (I was amused to hear someone in line outside talk about what a “beautiful” building it was). I’ll say at this point that I am not a fan of the arena rock experience, although it can be fun if you get in the right mindset.

Just getting the tickets in the first place was a bit of a mess (let’s just say it involved being in a different city, getting locked out of the house at the time of the on sale, and a mad dash downtown to get to a computer). So we ended up with seats to the side, more or less at an angle slightly behind the stage. We were literally in the last three seats – everything to our right was unfilled. At least we had a video screen. When the concert started, it didn’t really even feel like we were at the show – with our strange vantage point I felt like I was watching an arena full of people enjoying a concert. We could see McCartney’s back, and even funnier was the fact that we could see his teleprompter. Whenever Paul would come over to the sides and wave to the fans in the crappy seats (which he did quite often, showman that he is), people would go nuts cheering and waving. This always had us in hysterics for some reason. We more or less made a game of it: “the next time he comes over punch your fists in the air…okay, give him a thumbs up this time…” We also found it amusing how Paul liked to hoist his guitar up in the air when a song was finished. Once, after he stepped away from the piano and pointed up to the crowd, I joked that he did that because he wasn’t able to hoist the piano over his head. Too bad, that really would have made the crowd go nuts.

And then there was the guy my friend JT dubbed “Alley Oop.” About an hour or so into the show, a small group of men appeared to our right at the end of the section – about ten feet away. Most of them were well behaved, but one of them was drunk out of his mind and incredibly loud. Apparently, he wanted to hear some “rock and roll!” Well, that would be my guess, because that's what he kept yelling. We were really annoyed by him at first, but luckily the music drowned him out for the most part. What really had us laughing was his dancing – lots of air guitar, fist punches in the air, and hopping around like some sort of demented caveman. The way he was staggering, I’m surprised he didn’t take a tumble over the balcony.

Oh yeah, there were also a few songs to enjoy! Once we got used to the strange view we were able to get swept up in the music, and it started to feel like a “normal” concert. McCartney played for about 2-1/2 hours, over 30 songs, and had a terrific band backing him. The Beatles tunes sounded great, the Wings and older solo tunes were terrific, and the new songs were…well, not too bad, actually – they certainly didn’t have people running to the restrooms. Some of the highlights, of which there were many: opening with Magical Mystery Tour, Drive My Car (I wonder if Paul needed to consult his teleprompter to remember the chorus of “beep beep beep beep – yeah!”), Live and Let Die (the explosions startled us!), Jet, Let Me Roll It, Band on the Run, I’ve Got a Feeling, Back in the USSR, Too Many People (a real surprise from my fave Macca album Ram), Blackbird, I Will (it’s pretty amazing to see a guy who can hold a packed arena silent with a lone voice and an acoustic guitar), For No One, Get Back, Eleanor Rigby, Helter Skelter, the inevitable sing-along to Hey Jude…really too many to list them all.

Overall, I’d say the concert was pretty fun – despite the crappy seats and drunken caveman. I’d like to have heard a few more Wings tunes (Rock Show, Hi Hi Hi, and Junior’s Farm would have been welcome additions), but I might be the only person in the world who would admit to liking Wings that much. As far as other “dinosaur” rock acts I’ve seen in the past, I’d rate McCartney just as good as The Who and better than the Rolling Stones. I wouldn’t mind seeing him again, maybe next time I’ll luck into seats in front of the stage.